Sweet Surrender, Baby Surprise (3 page)

Determined to work out and get rid of the aches and pains, he slipped on a pair of gym shorts and sneakers, then left the suite for a brisk twenty-minute run around the resort grounds.

Forty-five minutes later, after a hot shower and two cups of coffee, he felt a whole lot better. A good thing, because he would need to be in peak condition to deal with the new occupants of his suite.

“Dada!”

Speaking of.

“Good morning,” Julia said as she carried Jake into the room. She had him in some kind of space-age kid carrier and without thinking, Cameron took it from her and placed carrier and baby up on the breakfast bar.

She was dressed in a sleek, navy pinstriped suit with
a crisp white blouse and black heels. Her wavy blond hair was tamed back into a simple ponytail. And why he found that look so damn sexy, Cameron couldn't figure out, but he knew he was on a slippery slope, watching her walk around the kitchen as she grabbed an apple for herself and warmed a bottle for the baby.

“Dada,” Jake whispered, gazing up at Cameron's face.

“He says that a lot,” Cameron said, staring at the kid. He realized as he spoke that Jake's repetition of the word
dada
didn't bother him half as much as it had last night.

“It feels good on his tongue,” Julia explained, then blinked and quickly turned toward the coffeemaker.

Cameron laughed as she crisscrossed the kitchen, her cheeks blushed pink after realizing what she'd just said. Obviously, she hadn't thought about the words before uttering them, and now he could think of a few things, too, that would feel good on
his
tongue.

“I've got a conference panel in forty minutes,” she said briskly, back to business after a few hurried sips of coffee. “I've arranged for a babysitter to watch Jake for the day, and she should be here any minute. But if you'd rather not have anyone in the suite while you're here, I'll understand. I can check with the concierge for another place to—”

“It's fine if the babysitter stays here.”

“Okay.” She nodded. “Good. Thanks.”

“Did you sleep well?” he asked.

“Wonderful, thank you,” she said, and rinsed her coffee mug. “You?”

“Like a rock,” he lied.

“That's great.”

Well, this was awkward. He leaned against the bar, watching as Julia put the mug in the dishwasher. Then he glanced over at Jake, whose eyes were closed. He was already sleeping peacefully, Cameron realized. Must be nice.

The doorbell rang and Jake's eyes flew open. His mouth quivered in a pout, and Cameron realized he was about to cry.

“Hey, kiddo, it's okay,” he said softly, and stroked his tummy. “Shh. Don't worry. Doorbells scare me, too.”

Jake stared up at Cameron as though his words were written on stone tablets. A wave of something powerful swept through him and he felt as if he just might be the most important person in the world in that moment.

“That must be the sitter,” Julia said, her voice a little hoarse. “I'll go let her in.”

Ten minutes later, the babysitter and Jake were ensconced in the back bedroom, and Julia was ready to leave. She had her purse strapped over her shoulder and she carried a soft leather briefcase. She looked like a lawyer instead of the best pastry chef on the Central Coast. Cameron walked her to the front door and opened it.

“I showed her where everything is and gave her my card in case she needs to call me,” Julia said nervously. “I won't turn off my phone.”

“Everything will be okay,” he said, and leaned against the door jamb, blocking her way out. “Look, we haven't talked about the paternity test yet.”

“Oh,” she said. With a frown, she dropped her briefcase and folded her arms across her chest. “I was hoping you'd changed your mind about that.”

He narrowed his eyes. “You don't think I'm handing
you a child support check until I've verified that Jake is my son, do you?”

“I don't need child support, Cameron,” she said testily. “You can keep your money.”

“Yeah, that's what they all say.”

Her lips thinned in anger. “First of all, it's Jake's comfort I'm concerned about. Do you have any idea how many immunizations he's been through in his short nine months? I've lost track of the number of needles he's had to suffer through. But don't worry, you'll have your damned paternity test. Second of all—”

“Look, Julia, I—”

She held up her hand. “Just let me finish before you say anything else you'll regret later about the money thing. Do yourself a favor, go online on Google and look up the Parrish Trust. When I get back, we'll talk about money.”

“Fine.” He realized he'd pushed her a little too far, but where did she get off thinking he'd just accept her word on everything?

She picked up her briefcase and started to walk out, but stopped again and glared at him. “And as long as you've got your computer fired up, you might want to take a look at those emails I sent you a while back. They just might paint a different picture than what you think is going on here.”

“Julia, I'm not—”

“And while you're at it,” she said, pulling a flowery scrapbook from her briefcase, “I brought this to show some friends, but you might want to take a look at it first.”

He stared at the thick journal, then began to thumb through it casually. There were photographs of the baby
affixed to the pages, along with handwritten passages describing the pictures. Frowning, he gazed at her.

“And one more thing,” she continued before he could say anything. “You caught me in a weak moment last night, but it won't happen again. We're willing to stay here with you for the next ten days, but there's no way I'm having sex with you. That's a deal-breaker.”

With that, she left the suite in a huff.

T
hat's a deal-breaker.

Sex? A deal-breaker? Not in this universe, Cameron thought. He could recall Julia melting in his arms last night and knew it was only a matter of time until he had her in his bed.

After she left for the conference, Cameron pulled his computer out of the second bedroom and set everything up in the dining room. That way, he wouldn't disturb Jake when it was nap time later.

Cameron couldn't get Julia's irate words out of his head so, with great reluctance, he finally did as she suggested and went online to research her family business.

Now, he sat back in his desk chair and stared at the computer screen. A thousand different thoughts ran
through his mind, but the first thing he did was pick up the phone and call his company's tech department.

After putting in a request that they immediately recover the emails from Julia he'd deleted more than eighteen months ago, Cameron hung up the phone and went back to gazing at the online information he'd pulled up on Julia Parrish and her family.

It was disturbing to read that Julia's parents had died in a small plane crash when she was ten years old. There were pages and pages devoted to her parents' philanthropy, but almost nothing on young Julia Parrish until she opened her popular bakery shop in Old Town Dunsmuir Bay four years ago.

Did she have other family in the area? Who had been responsible for raising her? Cameron found more questions than answers and knew they would have to talk about these and other issues tonight.

Aside from the news of her parents' death, the most shocking fact about Julia Parrish was that the woman was almost as wealthy as Cameron was. So why was she slaving away making cupcakes for other people?

It turned out that the Parrish Trust was one of the biggest and most influential charitable organizations in the state. The trust funded or underwrote everything from children's television to scientific research to humanitarian efforts on behalf of children everywhere. Cameron had heard of the Parrish Trust, of course. Who hadn't? But he'd never connected the dots from the trust to Julia, never had any reason to. Now, though, he had a reason.

No wonder Julia didn't care about Cameron's money. No wonder she'd given up on trying to contact him. She
didn't need Cameron Duke's support. The mother of his son was worth millions.

He didn't know how he felt about that. He supposed it wasn't a bad thing that little Jake would never want for anything in his life. In fact, that was definitely a good thing. But Cameron wanted to be the one to provide those things for his son. And he would. As soon as Julia got back to the suite, they would talk. He would tell her she didn't have to worry anymore about being the sole provider. Cameron was ready and willing to step in and take care of things from now on.

“Oh, that'll fly like a lead balloon,” he uttered, then shrugged. Didn't matter what she thought. Cameron was Jake's father and he would be responsible for him. Besides, why shouldn't Julia take a break and let Cameron shoulder some of the burden for a while? It's not like he was forcing her into a marriage. God forbid. Neither of them wanted that.

Although, now that he thought about it, a marriage between Cameron and Julia would be the best thing for Jake.

“But that's never going to happen.” He shoved his chair back from the table. If Cameron didn't do relationships, he sure as hell wouldn't ever do marriage. And that was okay. Jake would thrive with two parents who cared about him. They didn't need to be living together in order for the kid to have a good life.

Cameron hadn't exactly grown up with great role models. Quite the contrary, his dad had been a lousy excuse for a parent and a miserable marriage partner to his mom. Cameron had always said that if his parents were what marriage was all about, he wasn't interested.

And if his unhappy parents weren't enough of a reminder that marriage was out of the question for him, there was also the sacred pact he'd made with his brothers. He would never break that pact, ever.

Cameron could still picture the day, shortly after his eighth birthday, when he arrived at Sally Duke's big house on the cliffs of Dunsmuir Bay. At first, it was unsettling to learn that Sally had rescued two other boys from foster care along with Cameron, and that she expected all of them to become a family.

Those early weeks he spent getting to know Adam and Brandon were bumpy, to say the least. A pecking order needed to be established, so the three boys fought for supremacy over everything: toys, food, television shows, Sally's attention. They bickered and clashed just like eight-year-old boys were supposed to. At the same time, they worried that Sally might dump them back on the state coffers. It wouldn't be the first time for any of them. But they didn't know Sally Duke.

One day when she'd heard enough arguing, Sally banished the boys to the custom-designed tree house she'd had built for them. She told them they could come down when they'd learned to behave like friends and brothers.

Cameron, Adam and Brandon spent hours in that tree house, and eventually their worst secrets were unraveled and shared. Brandon's drug-addict mom ran off and his dad used to beat him until the man was killed in a bar fight. Adam's parents abandoned him when he was barely two years old. He was raised in an orphanage before being thrown into the foster care system.

Cameron finally confessed that his own father was a violent man and his mother bore the brunt of it. Not that
she was all that loving, given her appetite for alcohol and drugs. Cameron knew she had lied and stolen and worse to support her habit, but he blamed his father for turning her into an addict. He still had nightmares of his mother screaming from the beatings his father inflicted. Even worse, Cameron could never forget hearing his old man hit his mom while yelling that he was doing it because he loved her. And he would never forget waking up and finding them both dead. He was seven years old.

When Adam and Brandon heard that Cameron's dad thought he was showing love by beating the crap out of his mother, they both were disgusted. That led to the pact.

First, the three eight-year-olds swore loyalty to each other. Next, they made a sacred vow that they would never get married and have kids, because it was clear that marriage turned people mean and stupid. Married people hurt each other and their kids.

Finally, they vowed to make Sally Duke proud that she'd chosen them.

From that day forward, Sally let them know in a hundred different ways that they'd fulfilled their third vow—and then some. They'd all grown up to be honorable, successful men and she couldn't be more proud. Of course, now Sally had come up with some cockamamie plan to marry the brothers off so they could give her a bunch of grandkids. And despite all of his diatribes, Cameron had just given her exactly what she wanted.

“Oh, man,” he said aloud. The realization had him rubbing his knuckles against his chin. “Wait'll Mom gets a look at little Jake.” He chuckled in anticipation of the scene that awaited him when Sally heard the news.

Of course, she might be a little disappointed that he had no intention of marrying Julia, but she would just have to live with it. Cameron would never marry, that was all there was to it. He would never want to destroy someone else the way his parents had destroyed each other.

It's not like he'd been a martyr to his fate. Cameron had tested the waters more than once, in spite of the boyhood pact. But things had never worked out, to put it mildly. There had been plenty of women in his life and a few attempts at serious relationships, but they'd been disastrous. He'd used those as strong reminders that he'd come from bad stock and things would never change. He wasn't willing to put someone else through that kind of pain, let alone experience it again himself. No, he was meant to go it alone, and that suited him just fine, thanks.

He stood and checked his wristwatch. The babysitter had taken Jake for a long walk around the hotel grounds so Cameron could have a short meeting with his brothers here in the suite. They were due any minute.

They would soon find out they were uncles, Cameron thought. So much for sacred pacts. But at least Cameron hadn't been the first brother to break it. That honor went to Adam when he married Trish James last month.

The doorbell rang and Cameron greeted his brothers, then led the way to the kitchen. “You guys want beers?”

“You have to ask?” Brandon said, swinging the refrigerator door open and grabbing three bottles from the shelf.

“How's Trish?” Cameron asked Adam, knowing his brother had brought his wife along for a quiet, romantic weekend at Monarch Dunes.

“She's great,” Adam said with a smile. “She ran into Mom and her friends downstairs so they're probably relaxing at the pool by now.”

“Relaxing?” Brandon laughed. “We'd better get this over with so you can rescue her.”

“Good idea.” Adam sat at the dining room table and opened a thin binder of notes and spreadsheets.

Cameron and Brandon joined him at the table where they discussed some last-minute scheduling items that had arisen over the hand-off of priority projects from the Monarch Dunes resort to the Napa Valley property.

“You've done a great job with Monarch Dunes, bro,” Brandon said, tipping his beer bottle in Cameron's direction.

“Thanks,” Cameron said. “Napa's looking good, too.”

The three men had found out years ago that the best way to run their development company was to put each brother in charge of a particular property from start to finish. The Monarch Dunes property had been Cameron's baby from day one and he'd run the project much as he ran his life: with military precision.

The multifaceted, multileveled Craftsman-style resort, located forty miles south of their home town of Dunsmuir Bay, was already completely booked for the next three seasons and on its way to becoming the premier destination spot along California's Central Coast.

Cameron had had a hand in every decision along the way, from the expansiveness of the lobby that opened to a spacious terrace overlooking the ocean and cliffs, to the placement of the greens on the state-of-the-art
championship golf course that wound around the wide perimeter of the hotel.

“My staff is more than ready to have me move out of here,” Cameron admitted. “They've started saluting me when I ask them to do something.”

“When you
ask
them to do something?” Adam said sardonically. “More like barking out orders, I'd say.”

Brandon shook his head. “Once a marine, always a marine.”

With a shrug, Cameron said, “Hey, I just prefer to have things done the right way, so let's get back to business.” He read his notes off a legal pad. “I'll let my assistant know that the Napa grand opening will be pushed back one week to coincide with the grape harvest and crush. She can coordinate schedules with the Napa staff.”

The Dukes' Napa property was being built adjacent to the acres of vineyards and the winery they'd purchased years ago. The white wines were already being marketed all over the country and the reds were on the verge of reaching world-class status.

“Good,” Brandon said and walked toward the kitchen. “Hey, what's this?”

Too late, Cameron realized Brandon had picked up the scrapbook Julia had given him earlier. “It's nothing. I'll take it.”

But Brandon was already thumbing through the pages. “Dude, these are baby pictures. It's a baby album.”

“Who's the baby?” Adam asked, moving around the table to see what Brandon was looking at.

Hell.
Cameron reached for the book. “I'll take that.”

“I don't think so,” Brandon said and whipped the book away.

Adam pierced Cameron with a look. “Was there something you wanted to share with us?”

“I'm not playing this game.” Cameron held out his hand and waited calmly until Brandon gave him the thick scrapbook. “Okay, I'll see you guys later.”

“You're kidding, right?” Brandon said, both hands fisted on his hips. He turned to Adam. “I saw a shot of a pregnant woman. And an ultrasound photo.”

“So what?” Cameron said. He wasn't about to let his brothers see anything else in the book before he'd had a chance to thoroughly view every page.

“What's going on, Cam?” Adam asked quietly.

Feeling cornered but knowing there was no way out, Cameron sat back down at the table. “Fine. I was going to tell you anyway.”

“Well, let's hear it.” Brandon pulled out his chair and sat.

“I have a son.”

Stunned silence greeted his announcement. Brandon blinked a few times, opened his mouth to speak, but ended up saying nothing.

Adam's eyes narrowed. “Mind repeating that?”

Brandon folded his arms across his chest. “I knew that was an ultrasound.”

Cameron glared at Brandon. “No, you didn't.”

“Yeah, I did.” Brandon lifted his shoulders philosophically. “I'm smarter than I look.”

Adam and Cameron both laughed, easing some of the tension in the room.

“I think you owe us some explanation after dropping that bomb,” Adam said.

They'd only torment him until he spilled everything, so he gave them the abbreviated story of Julia and baby Jake.

“You never read the rest of her email messages?” Brandon said incredulously. “Weren't you curious? I would be.”

“Yeah, well, I've got more control than you,” Cameron said, his tone slightly defensive. “Control
issues,
you mean,” Brandon replied.

Adam chuckled. “I think we should check out some of those messages.”

“I told you I erased them all,” Cameron said, not willing to add that he'd also taken steps to recover them. By now, they were probably waiting in his email inbox.

Adam grabbed Cameron's shoulder and said, “Maybe so, but you've got the baby book. Let's check it out.”